Have you heard? Gem's pregnant! Things have predictably gotten a little more subdued around the nest, er, loft. I was just thinking about it yesterday, when Mikie and Immi dropped by.
“Do you guys have a regular laundry day?”
To say I was unprepared to talk laundry with Mikie would not do justice to the word “unprepared.” Gem and I exchanged puzzled looks.
“Need something cleaned, Mikie?” Gem asked, resting her tiny hands atop her baby bump while she shifted on the couch. At her feet, a toppled and nearly empty jar of peanut butter lay with a spoon jutting out of it. I noticed Immi staring at it with a puzzled look. “She’s eating for two now,” I whispered.
Mikie shook her head and handed me a zip top bag with a sheet of legal pad paper in it. “Take a look at this, sir.”
“What the fuck is this?”
“I believe it’s called a ‘ransom note,’ in the parlance of our times,” Immi intoned sagely.
“Yeah, but . . . “
“Purportedly authored by the thieves who robbed you,” said Mikie, tossing Gem a can of Pringles. “But it’s nothing to worry about.”
“Did she call you and ask you to pick those . . . fuck it, nevermind,” I said, slumping in my chair. “Purportedly? You mean to say that you think this might not be from the assholes who ripped me off?”
“There’s a cost to blogging about every little development in a highly complicated case with so many ins and outs,” continued Mikie, settling in beside Gem on our couch. “Copycats and wannabes come crawling out of the woodwork.” Her statement was underscored by the sound of Gem breaking the vacuum seal on her can of sodium heavy, ultraprocessed snacks.
“I bet these are fucking awesome with peanut butter,” Gem moaned.
Immi, meanwhile, seemed to be scanning the loft extremely attentively. “What, do you think they bugged the place, or came back?” I asked her.
“I’m just wondering if you have any Kahlúa,” she replied.
“Christ almighty!” I said. “We’re being asked to fork over a ransom! Am I the only one who isn’t thinking about their stomach, for a change? Mikie, help me out!”
“I wouldn’t say no to a margarita,” she said. “Heavy on the salt. Gem is inducing sympathy cravings.”
“What do I look like, a goddamn cabana boy?” I muttered, heading over to the bar. I looked to Gem, hoping for support. All I could focus on was a swipe of peanut butter clinging to her chin. I tried to be nonchalant as I gave her the universal “wipe your chin” signal.
“Have I got something . . .?” she began, laughing. “I’m pretty used to having to wipe my chin around Paul, but for different reasons altogether.”
“Baby! It’s your panties these creeps want!” I cried as I doled out drinks to Immi and Mikie.
“They can want all they want,” she said. "There's no way we're paying them off."
“I thought you might say that,” Immi replied with a giggle.
“I’m glad the three of you are so relaxed. Some creep or group of creeps are out there, holding our film ransom for a dozen pairs of worn panties, yet you act as if nothing . . . Maybe we ought to pay them off.“
“Easy, big guy,” Mikie said.
“Baby,” Gem said, smearing peanut butter onto a chip with the back of a spoon. “They’re amateurs. You don’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to see that they have no idea what they’re talking about.”
“How do you figure?”
She looked at me, smiling, before taking another bite. “Because I never wear panties, silly!”
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